


Exchange

by divybread



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Coping, Friendship, Loss, Love, Multi, Slice of Life, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-13
Updated: 2017-07-21
Packaged: 2018-12-01 16:32:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 18,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11490309
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/divybread/pseuds/divybread
Summary: Chanyeol signs up for an exchange program with his best friend Sehun, to go study in Berlin for a year. When Sehun gets into an accident with deadly consequences not two months later, Chanyeol is left to roam the streets of the German city on his own, having to try and find a way to cope with his loss so far away from everything familiar.





	1. The Beginning

There is a quiet sound on the breeze, like a soft jazzy music being played several houses down with the window open. The soft tones of the dreamy music float through the air and fill the cold, winter night with a certain feeling of accomplishment. As if nothing can go wrong in the world anymore. There’s a faraway police siren sounding up right in between, but when the sound dies away again, the small street becomes quiet and the world goes back to as it was.

Somewhere, someone is in trouble, in need of a police officer’s help. Somewhere, maybe, someone is even in dire need of aid. Perhaps it wasn’t a police car but an ambulance even. Somewhere, someone might be close to dying, their loved ones in a panic, the neighbours standing right outside their doors to see what’s going on. A sad scene, probably played in slow motion would it be one in a movie, with extra emphasis on the bystanders looking on in horror and shock.

The jazzy music ends, the new song has a more upbeat resonance, and for a moment Chanyeol finds himself staring blankly ahead at the world before his mind brings up an entirely different scenario to the thoughts he’s just been having. Maybe someone’s water broke and they need an urgent ride to the hospital to deliver a healthy baby. Maybe someone is on their way to create life, rather than one being taken. Maybe in the distance, the faraway siren just signals a police officer on their way to a traffic control position.

A soft, amused snicker is pulled from him when he realises the darkness of his own expectations. Looking down into his cup of hot coco, he sighs when he finds it’s as good as empty. With practiced ease, he lifts his legs and slides off the window sill, back into the small room he temporarily calls his own. Closing the window behind him with one hand, he takes a long moment to breathe in the lingering scent of a cold, winter night before he walks off towards his tiny kitchenette.

The house is quiet, for a change, most of the exchange students who have rooms here like him are out to party on this very bright albeit cold Friday night. He didn’t go out with them for a change because he sorely needs to do something about his continuously dropping grades. Something like studying. Five hours into the evening home alone he has watched two movies, drank several cups of spiced hot coco and draped himself over every available, comfortable surface in the room. He has not, however, studied yet.

Come to think of it, it seems a little strange for him to have made such a decision. He always studies when the finals are around the corner, never does so throughout the year. And although it’s ‘already’ November per some people, there is no reason for panic yet whatsoever. So, he decides that maybe he just really wanted to have this evening in on his own with a fuzzy blanket, hot coco and complete freedom to play his music (and porn) as loud as he wants.

The grin that appears on his face at the thought of said means of entertainment is a little perverse, perhaps, but he still proceeds to turn on his computer once more so he can find something exciting to watch on his night in alone.

A good hour later, this or the other site he was going to use for his personal needs still is open on his internet browser, but the mouse remains untouched after opening it up. The fuzzy blanket lies draped over the floor in a straight line to the door, his cup of hot coco abandoned on the ground next to his desk, smashed to pieces with some leftover drink puddled around. There are two non-matching shoes missing from the pile at his door, which itself is still left slightly ajar, the keys still hanging from the lock on the inside.

He himself stands with his face pressed against a wall, hands resting on each side of it, his eyes pressed closed tightly. His breathing comes in hitches, or at least that’s what it feels like, the world around him seeming to twirl uncontrollably even though he can’t see it. There’s sounds mixing together from the world around him, but he has a hard time focusing to realise what they all mean. Until his name sounds through loudly and clearly.

“Chanyeol!” There’s an urgency to the voice, so he lifts his head from the wall and turns to look towards the girl running over. She’s a head shorter than him and he allows her a little too easily to crash into him, arms sneaking around his waist and face hiding against his chest. Usually they wouldn’t be this close at all, they never really got along very well after all, but in this moment, she is the only one in the whole country who probably manages to feel something remotely close to what he’s feeling.

“I’m sorry, Jess,” is what he eventually manages to utter, hand stroking awkwardly over her thin back as he tries to comfort her in the only way he knows how. He’s never been good with the waterworks, after all. Especially not the female ones. “I-“ There’s nothing more to add to his comfort and he knows it, so he decides to just close his mouth again and continues stroking her back. “They called him. Eleven thirty. Deceased.”  Maybe he should’ve left that unsaid as well.


	2. First Trace

The sky outside the Starbucks he’s in is colouring ever darker, but he’s too focused on the screen of his phone to realise. His fingers are tapping away eagerly, none of his attention left for the outside world.

He doesn’t see a reason to pay attention anyway. It’s a week since he was in the hospital with Jess trying to grasp the reality of the situation, he’s been back home to Korea to attend the funeral, but has now been forced to make his way back to Berlin to continue his studies. He doesn’t see the use of it anymore. Why had they decided to go to Berlin of all places to begin with? They should have just gone to Japan, like their other friends had opted for. But no, they had to go to freaking Berlin.

Because who wouldn’t want to go study in Germany, Europe, if they had a chance to? Because Berlin is a perfect somewhat central-base to travel around the continent and see all the beautiful, old cities and buildings that they could otherwise only see in the movies. They visited Paris already in the summer, as well as London. Barcelona, too, and Madrid, even Bruges. So he knows, rationally, why they had decided to come to Berlin, as it has already paid off tremendously, but now that he’s back here alone, without Sehun to keep him company and make his usual offhand sarcastic comments, he wishes he’d picked a place closer to home. That way he could’ve at least visited familiar faces a little more often than twice a year.

The chair across from him is pulled backwards and a tall Asian guy sits himself down like the table isn’t already occupied. Frowning, Chanyeol glances up at the intruder with a clearly disapproving expression. What he’s met with, however, is an unaffected gaze focused directly on him. He forgets to look back down at his screen because of how he’s being looked at, and mumbles an instant curse when the sound of defeat reaches him through his headphones. He decides to leave the game for what it is for the time being and looks back up at his new, unknown companion.

“What the hell’s your problem, dude?” Is what he asks, in Korean, as he pulls one earphone out so he can focus on the guy across from him. To his utter surprise, the response is instant and in clear, understandable Korean as well. He should’ve not just assumed this guy to not speak the language, of course, the Asian looks should’ve made him a little weary.

“You’re Chanyeol, right? I’m a friend of Sehun’s.” The effect of the all too familiar name is more impactful than he could have imagined, as it feels like an axe is thrusted right into the middle of his chest, lodged inside and making it hard for him to take a proper breath. Still his survival instincts are bigger than the impact of the grief and so it doesn’t take more than a split second for him to reply to the male opposite of him in a less than acceptable fashion.

“Yeah? Sorry to break it to you then, buddy, but he’s dead. So whatever you were of him, you ain’t anymore.” The male opposite of him doesn’t seem very bothered by his words, which probably means that he was already aware of the situation. Well, if he was really a friend of Sehun’s, then probably Jess had already spoken to him and that would explain the lack of surprise. Jess hadn’t been able to fly to Korea for the funeral, after all, she had probably done the necessary (as well as unnecessary) informing of everyone and their dogs.

“I am aware.” The reply is almost too void of emotion, Chanyeol just doesn’t trust the guy across from him and it’s only been five seconds since they met – give or take. “That is why I’m here talking to you and not in my regular spot having a conversation with Sehun.” The name, again, collapses into him with a weight he never thought could be possible. How could one single, small, usually so familiar and often-used name crash into him with such force, all because the bearer of it had gone? “So if you would be so kind as to come with me, then we can talk in private.”

Something brings him to his feet. He doesn’t know what it is, but it definitely isn’t his brain telling his body to move, because his brain is still stuck on the name Sehun and all that it implies. Years of friendship, a young man who was like a brother to him, their first glass of Soju together, Christmas at each other’s house, a never-ending plane ride to the other side of the world for an exchange year of studying in the anonymous and beer-filled streets of Berlin.

One, tiny, stupid little puddle of water on the edge of a balcony, and one, tiny, stupid little drunk dude with an elbow that couldn’t just have missed the goddamn best thing in his life.

“Alright, what do you want?” He decides to keep talking Korean, because what are the odds of a third guy who speaks Korean in Berlin just happening to walk past right during their private conversation.

“My condolences,” the tall guy says, sounding so damn righteous that Chanyeol momentarily feels like punching him square in the face. “Sehun’s a great guy.” Punch. This time straight in his gut. Whatever appetite he still had for dinner is completely gone now. “Can’t believe the one time he decides to go to a party without you, something like that happens. To Sehun of all people. I mean, if anyone would’ve been least likely to have that happen, Sehun would’ve been on top of that list.”

“Yes, well, it goddamn happened!” Chanyeol pauses in his step when he realises how aggressively those words come out of him, shaking his head lightly and clearing his throat. “What’s your damn point? What do you want from me?”

“Kris, give the guy a break. Seriously. You don’t know anything about people at all, do you?”

Oh yes, there is the third Korean speaking guy in Berlin, right in the same dimly lit street as the other two of them are in. Chanyeol turns his head to look at him, frowning deeply. What he is faced with is a friendly smile, sparkling eyes and the softest of faces he thinks he’s ever seen. The new stranger doesn’t try to put a hand on him but instead wraps an arm almost lovingly around the taller male – Kris was what he had called him.

“I’m sorry about Kris,” the stranger continues, beaming a smile at Chanyeol that should be too bright to be real, but somehow it comforts him and he feels all the ache that has built up inside of him settle down a little. “He’s not very good with words, or people’s feelings. Or personal space, for that matter. I’m Luhan, it’s nice to meet you. You must be Chanyeol, right?”

He nods, because there is really nothing much else he can do. “How wonderful to finally meet you. The circumstances are dreary, of course, such a shame, but we’d long been talking about having him introduce us to you.” The voice keeps speaking and Chanyeol is pretty sure that in any other situation he would’ve gotten annoyed by now, but he feels no such thing towards Luhan. Although Kris seems more than annoyed with the shorter guy’s appearance. He doesn’t say anything more, however.

“We were in his extracurricular class with him,” Luhan continues, pulling a student card out of his pocket and holding it up in front of his face long enough to recognise it, before putting it away again. “After what happened we just wanted to talk to you. I told Kris here to wait until I was there too, but you know…” A look is exchanged between the two and Chanyeol feels like more things are discussed than he can understand. “He’s not so good at listening.” Luhan grins brightly over at him and he feels his own mouth pull up in a response smile.

“So what do you want?” He inquires again, but this time it sounds a lot friendlier, even to his own ears. “I’m not exactly in the mood to have a chat.”

“No, no, of course not,” Luhan agrees cordially, nodding his head in understanding. “But we were thinking that maybe you could use some help with clearing out his room. We could help pack up some stuff, you’d just have to decide which things go back to his home, which ones have to be given back to the school and which you’d like to keep here.”

Clearing out Sehun’s room is indeed something his parents had asked him to do for them, as it would save them another double trip to Berlin and back. The money wasn’t growing on their backs, after all, and the sudden death of their son had taken its toll as well. He had agreed for the sole reason that Sehun’s mother had been close to crying as she asked and he had never been good with the waterworks, especially not when it was a woman crying. Also, Sehun’s mom was too much like his own to him, it wasn’t like he could refuse her anything.

“Sure.” He hears himself say it before he realises the implications of it, but doesn’t try to alter his words. “You guys free? I got time now. Then we can get that over with straight away.” He sees Kris make a face at the agreement, which makes no sense since they’re the ones to have asked him to do this with him in the first place, but he doesn’t mention it any further, deciding to just ignore what he’s seen.

“Yeah, we can go with you now. That sounds like a great idea, doesn’t it, Kris?” Luhan chimes and he swears he hears Sehun’s amused, bugging voice echo within the sound, but that’s the stupidest thing he’s ever imagined, so he quickly shakes off the idea. This guy might look like Sehun a little, that doesn’t mean that his best friend has come back in the body of some godforsaken Chinese student in Berlin.

If only.

 

_“Hey, scarecrow, come check this out, I found a video of you.” Snorting at the nickname, Chanyeol makes his way over to the bed, where Sehun’s seated with his computer on his lap, browsing the internet randomly. Flopping himself down next to his best friend, Chanyeol reaches out a hand to already jab Sehun in the side. He doesn’t have to see the video to know it’s going to be insulting, the amusement in Sehun’s voice has already told him enough._

_Turning his face to the computer screen the next moment, he is only proven right when what appears on the screen is nothing other than an alpaca dressed up with a snapback and a Hawaiian shirt, walking around its pen._

_“Dude,” he states in amused disbelief, shaking his head and giving Sehun another shove. “Seriously, where do you keep finding these things? Last time with the Batman dog, now this. What does Jess have to say about you browsing stupid videos all day?”_

_Sehun snorts, giving him an incredulous look. “What would she have to say about anything,” is the response he gets and it makes him burst out in laughter. Sehun’s grinning at him as well for a moment before continuing to scroll down his Facebook feed, probably in search of more silly videos._

_Allowing his friend to do whatever he wants, Chanyeol crawls up into a half-seated position, draping himself over the edge of the bed slightly and turning his head so he can look at Sehun upside-down. “So, are you going to a party with me again sometime soon? It’s been ages since I saw you pretend to dance and even longer since we had some fun together drinking.”_

_One good thing about Berlin is its unlimited supply of every kind of delicious beer known to mankind - and the only sixteen years’ age limit on drinking said beer._

_“Maybe tomorrow, alright?” Sehun responds absentmindedly. “I’ve got to do some studying tonight. I really don’t know how you keep up with that guy from History.”_

_“I don’t,” Chanyeol replies easily. “I just keep up with whoever does keep up with him and then pay them the right amount of beers to get my hands on their summaries.” He’s already grinning at the end of his words and Sehun only looks at him shortly before starting to grin as well. It doesn’t take long or they’re both laughing heartily._

 

The bed is empty when he enters the room with Sehun’s key. The whole room is empty. And cold as well. A small but efficient reminder of how Sehun hasn’t been in this room anymore for a good week. For some reason, however, Sehun undid the bed of its bedlinen right before heading to the party, as it is to be found on the pile of dirty laundry. Almost as if Sehun had known and had wanted to make things easier on them. Chanyeol lets out a snort at that thought, shaking his head and stepping inside the room.

“Alright, so… You guys can take the study books and put them into a box. I’ll go through his closet first, then I’ll check the other stuff on the desk.”

“I’ll separate the laundry,” Luhan instantly chimes in, nudging Kris towards the desk, even though the taller male doesn’t seem interested at all in going through study books. Chanyeol decides not to care. If they didn’t want to help, then they shouldn’t have offered, after all.

“Whatever works for you,” is therefore what he replies, heading over to the closet and opening it up. A solid wave of Sehun’s all too familiar scent washes over him from the clothes inside and he feels his heart constrict painfully. Staring blankly at the clothes for a long moment, he tries his best to regain his composure and then just starts to pull clothes out of the closet to drop them in Sehun’s luggage.

He ignores the way he distinctly remembers helping Sehun pack the same luggage for the trip to Berlin, ignores the outrageously rainbow-coloured boa that they had both bought on their drunken first night in the city and even manages to breeze right past the slim fit black leather jacket that they’d bought back in Korea as a sign of their friendship. They’d been drunk that time, too, but had kept the jackets mostly because they looked awesome in them.

Now he is the only one to remember the jacket’s cheesy meaning as well as the complete and utter exhilaration and freedom the rainbow coloured boa stands for. The punch in his gut is once again sudden, but he tries his best to not flinch outwardly. He’s not alone, after all, even though he now wishes he would have done this on his own.

At least in the secluded loneliness of the room he would’ve been able to just collapse onto his knees, press one or the other sweater close to his face and cry without caring about the outward look of that action. Now he has no other choice but to swallow the ache and continue with business like usual – as if the most important person in his life hasn’t been ripped away. As if he doesn’t care that Sehun’s dead.

“Would you like to do this alone?” Almost as if this Luhan guy can read his mind. His pride tells him to say no, to not let them know how he is affected, but he so desperately wants them to be gone so he can collapse after all. Eventually the idea that he doesn’t owe these people anything – most of all not to keep them around – is what makes him turn his head towards the slightly expectant look on the shortest male’s face.

“Yes, please. I think I’d prefer to do this alone.”

Luhan nods, the other guy just leaves the books be again without looking up. He swears the big guy had a name and he swears he knew that name until just a minute ago, but does it really matter? He barely manages to wait for the door to close behind his two almost-helpers before sinking to his knees and starting to sob.


	3. Second Trace

“Chanyeol?” It’s a little rude perhaps, but he wishes he could ignore the voice. Ignore the entire rest of the world, really. Just be an existing something, floating about the world’s surface until perhaps a car hits him and he has a good excuse to follow his best friend to the void.

A little too much angsty teen maybe? The thought – something Sehun would have definitely brought up – makes him grin earnestly for a moment until the amusement turns bitter. His best friend will never be able to make such comments again. Ever. Such is the nature of death. A cruel and undeserved fate.

“Chanyeol?” Oh. Right. He has apparently actually ignored the outside world for a while. He looks up at the male speaking his name and is faced with Luhan’s smiling face. Surprisingly there’s no concern visible in the lines of his expression, nor any impatience or annoyance. It’s like Luhan doesn’t mind that he’s just been ignored for a good couple minutes. The smile on Luhan’s face even widens a little as if in greeting upon realising he’s looking at him.

“Good afternoon.” It’s that late already? He has no idea what time it is, but somehow trusts Luhan’s judgement.

“Afternoon.” A small nod of acknowledgement follows before he looks at his own surroundings to double check where the hell he actually is. Halfway home, apparently, after having gone to get a burger for lunch. Ah yes, lunch, so it is afternoon indeed by now.

“Mind if I walk with you?” As if he hasn’t already been doing that while waiting for him to reply, but…

“Sure. Road belongs to everyone.” Is he really turning into _that_ person? A short thinking of something better to say reveals that yes, he is turning into that person. Sehun would have laughed at him.

Sehun’s gone now.

The world is a shit place.

“How are you holding up?”

“I’m not.” It’s an honest answer. Perhaps too much information for Luhan. If he didn’t want to know, he shouldn’t have asked. No use in pretending when you don’t like the audience. Another one of those Sehun quotes. Fuck that name. He focuses on Luhan again. The guy’s still smiling. Like the expression can’t be wiped from his face. Fuck him, too.

“I’m sorry.” There’s some concern laced into the words as well, but he doesn’t really want to hear it. People have pitied him enough already. It would be nice if they could leave him alone for a change.

“Yeah, everyone is. You’re gonna have to be a little more original.”

His companion flinches, but he can’t seem to get himself to care. It’s cold inside of him. He misses Sehun. Even thinking of the name tears him apart, really. He doesn’t even fully remember why he decided to go outside to eat anymore. It would have been easier to order in and not have to see anyone or deal with anyone.

“I’m sorry, Chanyeol.” He looks up only a couple moments after Luhan said those words, but sees no one with him anymore. All the better.

 

Somehow, he makes it back to his dorm, closes the door behind him and shuts himself away from any and every living being. He crawls into bed without bothering to take his clothes off and pulls the blanket over his head just so that he can ignore the entire outside world while still being able to breathe properly.

His solitude lasts all of a minute before something sinks down on the bed with him.

“What the…!?” The words are ripped from him in his surprise as he launches himself off the bed, pushing the blanket off him to be able to look at the bed and see who the hell had been in his room without him noticing. His butt collides with the floor rather painfully and he has to put down a hand to keep himself from toppling over, but the pain of neither of those things really registers because… There’s no one there.

Looking around to make sure that he didn’t just overlook someone but that there’s really nobody around, he carefully pushes himself back up in a standing position. He’s just about to tell himself he’s simply imagining things when the faint sound of sobs reaches him. Staring around in wide-eyed horror now, he tries to find a glimpse of whoever it is. He considers for a moment that maybe it’s someone in another room, but the sound is too close for it.

“Who’s there?” he eventually manages to utter, staring out at the room and frowning. There is no response. Only the continued sobbing. “Jess?” If she’s crying in his closet or something crazy like that he is going to call the police. He doesn’t care how close she and Sehun always were, something like that is going one step too far. Several steps even.

Carefully stepping around his room, he checks every corner and every empty space large enough to fit a human, but finds no one. There isn’t even any sign of anyone else having been in his room. That is, until he turns and looks back at his bed, where an obvious dent is visible in the mattress, as if someone’s sitting there.

Shocked and scared, he simply turns on his heels to make a run for his door, throwing it open and rushing out into the hallway…only to collide face-first with someone’s chest in his haste to get away.

Instead of being reprimanded for his clumsiness or shoved away harshly – like he would have done if someone had run into him like that – he just feels two arms wrap around him and pull him into a tight hold. Suspicious about the reason for this action, he tries to struggle out of the grip, but his resistance takes all of one moment before he gives in more easily than he’s ever given in to anyone and just lets himself sag in the arms of the yet unknown person.

 

“Chanyeol?” That same voice as before, now trying to raise him from a slumber rather than from a time of not wanting to communicate with anyone ever again. He really doesn’t want to pay attention to it, but this time it’s even more adamant than the last one, because only moments later his name is already spoken again. “Chanyeol? Wake up. Hey! Chanyeol!”

He lets out a groan, turning over onto his side and pulling the blanket up higher over himself. The next moment the blanket is gone and he is being nudged against his side rather harshly.

“Chanyeol, come on, wake up.” He sighs, utters some sort of insult to this rude interrupter of dreams and then finally cracks open an eye to see who exactly needs him at a way too early hour in the morning.

His heart stops when he sees Sehun’s face and he stares for a long moment, until the features dissipate on their own and he slowly starts to recognise the one who’s really in front of him.

“Luhan,” he croaks, a slight question in his voice. Somehow, he never manages to get the right annoyed tone when he’s talking to this guy, as if there’s some unknown pit of kindness inside of him of which Luhan is the only receiver. “What the heck are you doing in my room?”

Which is a more than proper question to ask, he figures, but someone still snorts behind him and somehow the sound of that person just sets every defensive fibre in him on edge. He instantly turns over to be able to look at the person there, coming eye to eye with the most rotten and despicable person you’d ever manage to find in the world.

“Kris…” he speaks, none of the friendliness of earlier left in his voice. “What the hell are _you_ doing in my room?” The Chinese guy has the guts of smirking in amusement, which only manages to set him more on edge, before he suddenly notices one key detail.

“I’d have no proper answer to your question if this _were_ in fact your room, but alas it isn’t. You’re in the hospital. And as to why I’m here; Luhan forced me to come.”

He would look over at Luhan to see why the male would do such a thing, but his attention remains stuck on the walls and door of the room he’s in. Definitely not his room, indeed, and very obviously so a hospital, too. He hates to admit that Kris might have had a point snorting at his question, but instantly swears never to admit that aloud.

“Wha- Why am I here?” he eventually utters, turning his attention to Luhan as if to make sure that it would be the shorter male answering him, because he seems to be able to take things from him way easier.

“Dehydration and lack of nourishment, mostly. We caught you in your hallway. You don’t remember? You burst out of your room like a madman and crashed straight into Kris as we were about to knock. We tried to ask you what was wrong but you passed out before we had a chance to.” Luhan’s explanation is short and simple, but he still stares at the other male for a good minute with no understanding whatsoever. Dehydration? Passed out? _Kris’_ arms? Well the world has gone to hell indeed now that Sehun is dead.

A bitter laugh leaves his lips the next moment as he shakes his head lightly once, before starting to smile at Luhan. “I thought life couldn’t get any worse but I guess it just did if I passed out in Kris’ arms,” he states, chuckling mirthlessly and shaking his head lightly at the thought. What passes over Luhan’s expression looks like sadness and hurt, but he can’t be entirely sure because he doesn’t even know the guy that well.

“I’m sorry,” Kris speaks up before Luhan can say anything, but there’s no apology audible in the tall male’s tone of voice. He turns to look at the guy when he continues. “Next time I’ll make sure you don’t end up in my arms but rather on the floor with the bruises to go with it.”

“Kris!” Luhan immediately chides, but there’s no sign of regret or shame on Kris’ face. Chanyeol finds that this, too, irks him. “Would you cut it out!?” Luhan’s voice suddenly has a certain edge to it, so Chanyeol turns his head quickly to look at the Chinese male and see what it is. But before he still catches the way Kris’ expression changes right before his eyes leave the man. All of a sudden it’s like there’s pain there, too. It’s weird and the thought of Kris being in pain makes him uncomfortable somehow, like that’s not something you ever wanted to know a person was capable of feeling. Like how you never want to see how your parents can hurt or be in pain. Although Kris is nowhere near anything like a parent to him…

“Let’s go.” Kris states then, getting up from his chair and nodding his head at Luhan. “He’ll manage this one on his own. We don’t need to be here for him. He clearly doesn’t want us near anyway?”

Luhan’s eyes linger on Kris for a moment, Chanyeol can see the different emotions take turns in passing over the Chinese man’s expression, before eventually a decision is made. “Alright,” Luhan speaks then, turning to him and starting to smile lightly again. “I hope you’ll be alright, Chanyeol. My phone number is on this note here, text me when you’re out of the hospital, okay?”

He nods mutely, then watches how both Chinese males leave the room. Only when he’s all by himself again does he realise how strange it is for him to be malnourished since he’s eaten plenty of burgers and fries over the past week. But perhaps he’s in need of other things than that and it’s exactly that which necked him; too many burgers. He figures he’ll have plenty of chances to ask a nurse later.

 

The next day he’s back in his dorm room. There is no more dent in his bed and he has not heard any weird sounds anymore since he’s returned from the hospital, so he figures it was the dehydration after all. It sounds like something impossible, but who is he to judge, really? Not a doctor, that’s for sure. He goes to take a shower first, properly washing himself, and then returns to put on a proper set of clothes again, dropping the ones from the hospital into the laundry bin instantly.

_“Hey, big guy, you got any clothes I can borro-” Sehun’s voice dies off when he spots the laundry bin overflowing with clothes in the corner of his room. “Nevermind, looks like you’re in dire need of a trip to a washing machine. Come on, let’s go do your laundry.” He glances up over his shoulder to check the laundry bin and reply something along the lines of “it’s not necessary’ but before he can do so, Sehun has already shaken his head. “It’s most definitely necessary. Come on, get off your ass, let’s go.”_

The temporary flashback leaves him with a slight smile on his face and a dull ache in his chest, but before he can allow himself to let the hurt overtake him, the sound of his door opening pulls his attention. When he turns his head towards it, however, it’s still closed and there’s no one in the room with him. He’s on edge again instantly, but reminds himself not to storm out of his room like an idiot again, because getting embarrassed like that once is one time too many.

“Hello?” he asks hesitantly, but there is no response, only the quiet of his empty dorm room accompanies him. And then, suddenly, he realises he can hear two strangely familiar voices talking quietly. Far away, as if from a dream, even though he’s damn sure he’s never had a dream like this one.

_‘Come on, there’s nothing more you can do for him right now, Luhan.’_ The name sends a flash of recognition through him and he realises it’s Kris talking.

“What the hell are you guys doing in my room again?” He asks, looking around to find the two Chinese people, but he can’t see them. And there definitely isn’t any way Kris is hiding from him behind the lamp because that guy is too obnoxious not to be noticed. Before he can call out to them again, he realises they’ve continued talking as if they haven’t even heard him, voices still sounding like a faraway echo.

_‘I just can’t stand to see him like this. There must be something I can do.’_

_‘There’s nothing you can do right now, Luhan. He needs to do this on his own. He needs to make up his own mind. You can’t do it for him.’_

_‘I guess you’re right. You probably are. I’m sorry, Yifan. It’s just so hard.’_

_‘It’s alright, Luhan, I understand. But we can better go. It’ll be easier if you don’t have to watch.’_

_‘Okay.’_

The sound dies away after that baffling conversation and Chanyeol is left standing on his own in the middle of his room, a shoe in hand as a weapon to throw at his intruder’s head, only to realise there are no intruders whatsoever. Only voices in his head with no actual existence in his room. Is he going crazy? He doesn’t feel like he’s going crazy. But why the hell else would he be hearing the voices Kris and Luhan of all people?

And what the hell were they talking about? Or better; who?


	4. Third Trace

“Chanyeol, what is going on with you?”

He looks up at Jessica when she calls that out to him. She’s giving him a worried look, but he’s not entirely sure what he’s done this time. Until he glances around and notices that it’s been getting dark outside, even though he has no knowledge of all that time passing.

“Nothing. Nothing’s going on.”

The look on Jessica’s face tells him she doesn’t believe a word of what he’s saying, but he can’t even be bothered with her feelings anymore.

“You can’t tell me there’s nothing going on, Chanyeol. You hardly eat, you hardly speak, it’s like you don’t even realise anyone’s around you anymore. I’ve been talking to you for the past hour but you haven’t replied with anything but hums and the occasionally nod.”

He knows Jessica’s probably right, but he just can’t be bothered to talk to her anymore. He doesn’t want to be faced with his incapability of living life properly. He’s ignored his teachers’ wishes to talk to him, has rejected his parents calls, everything so he wouldn’t have to hear how badly he’s failing at life, and now Jessica was going to start with him too?

“Look, just… Leave me alone.” He pushes his chair back and gets up, staring down on Jess for a moment and feeling nothing but hate for this girl who does nothing but be a solid reminder to him. “We are not friends, Jess. We’ve never been friends. The only reason you talk to me is because we were both friends with Sehun. But guess what? Sehun’s dead. He’s gone. There’s nothing left anymore to tie us together. No one left to pretend for. So just leave me the hell alone!”

With those last words, he grabs his phone off the table and storms out of the Starbucks they were seated in. He makes way for home with haste, not wanting her to come after him and stop him – or for anyone else to stop him, really.

When he gets back to his dorm, he’s stopped short in the hallway at the all too familiar door that leads to Sehun’s room. But not because the door reminds him of Sehun. No, he stops because of the voice that sounds up from that room.

_‘I know you’re there. I can hear you talking.’_

He looks around, trying to find the person with the recording device, trying to pinpoint exactly who is playing this sick prank on him, but the hallway is deserted.

_‘Just show yourself. I need to talk to you.’_

The all too familiar voice is filling his chest with a deep, strong aching that he just can’t seem to shake. Slowly reaching out to the door knob, he hesitates a moment before taking a hold of it and twisting it so he can enter the room.

He’s faced with the bare, stripped room he left behind the last time he was in there, after he’d taken out all of Sehun’s stuff like he’d been supposed to do. There is no one inside and nothing else there except for the bed, desk, closet and kitchenette. Which means he is officially losing his mind, doesn’t it? Because he’s more than certain that he really heard Sehun’s voice from inside this place, that he wasn’t imagining it. But what if he was?

_‘Alright, you got me. What do you want?’_

He startles when the next sentence is spoken as clearly as if the person talking is standing next to him. And he recognises that voice too. It’s all too familiar, belonging to a certain Chinese asshole whom he wishes he’d never met in his lifetime. He twirls around to be able to come face to face with Kris, but there’s nobody there. The hallway behind him is empty on both sides, no trace of anyone else.

_‘I need your help.’_

He twirls back towards the room, but of course there is no Sehun either to fit with the voice he’s hearing. Terrified and hurt he freezes in place for a split second, but then just bolts out of the room. The door slams closed behind him as he hurries over to his own room, where he goes straight to his sink so he can splash some water in his face and calm down.

 

It’s the middle of the night when he wakes from his slumber, disoriented and groggy. His entire room is dark, the alarm clock telling him it’s about three in the morning and there is no sign of whatever it was that pulled him from his most needed sleep. Rubbing his eyes, he pushes himself up on one elbow to look around the room and see if anything fell to the ground, but there’s nothing.

_‘Luhan is not going to like this, you know?’_

A scream leaves his throat when the voice sounds up so suddenly, way too close for comfort, as if Kris is sitting on the edge of his bed. But this time there is no dent there. Until a moment later a dent forms as his mattress sinks under the weight of a person sitting down. He instantly crawls away from the invisible intruder, but has nowhere to go since the other side of his bed rests against the wall.

_‘I know. But this is not about Luhan.’_

Sehun’s voice again. Crystal clear. People always told him the first thing you forget is someone’s voice, yet he’s remembering it like he’s only last heard it yesterday rather than several weeks ago. The voice comes from the place where the dent is. He can do nothing but stare at it, as if the people talking are going to appear if he just watches intently enough. No one appears, but the voices do continue.

_‘You realise this is very risky. If you don’t manage, you’ll both be dead.’_ That’s Kris talking again and Chanyeol feels the anger fill him. He doesn’t know why this guy gets him on edge so easily, because he’s never met him before and he’s usually not such a violent person, but he just wants to grab him, give him a good shake and punch him a couple times. A lot of times, truth be told.

_‘I know, Yifan, but I have to do it.’_ What’s with the name? When he’d heard Kris and Luhan talk, Luhan had used that name as well. But if that was Kris’ real name than why had he not been told? Luhan seemed to be using his real name, he didn’t understand what the problem was. Then again, he didn’t understand very much of any of this going on, there probably was a logic explanation for all of it.

A logic explanation, for him hearing Sehun talk in the middle of the night even though the guy had been dead for weeks? Right. Yeah. That was going to go over great with anyone he told.

_‘Look I’m not complaining. You’ll be doing me a favour.’_ Kris again. If only lightning could strike from heaven and take down that guy, he’d be thrilled.

_‘This is going to affect your relationship with him, isn’t it? And with Luhan?’_ Sehun, sounding a little remorseful this time.

_‘It will, but that’s on me. I’ll gladly take his anger if it saves him. And Luhan… Luhan will understand. He can’t do anything if it’s your own choice anyway.’_ Kris sounds almost reassuring and for a single moment, Chanyeol doesn’t feel as angry as he has been since he’s met the guy. For a moment he even feels grateful, that the tall Chinese man had given Sehun some reassurance and comfort. Until he remembers that this is all imaginary and Kris has done nothing whatsoever. Because Sehun is dead. He can’t be hearing these voices. He’s going crazy.

_‘Tell him I’m sorry.’_ As if to taunt him, it’s Sehun who speaks again. He lifts his hand and clutches his head, squeezing his eyes closed and trying his hardest to ward off the voices. He doesn’t want to hear them. They’re not real. They can’t be real.

_‘He will know.’_

It’s the last thing he hears, the sound fading a little at the end as if he’s being pulled away from wherever these two people had been having the conversation. Suddenly he feels very tired and heavy. When he opens his eyes to look around and see why that is, he catches a vague glimpse of a person’s shape, but then his consciousness gives out.

 

He wakes again in his own bed, startling when he remembers what happened in the middle of the night. Quickly looking around, he realises there still isn’t anyone in the room with him, and it looks like no one has been either. But he still gets up to check if the door is still locked, which it is. It’s mildly scary, the entire situation, but he doesn’t know what to do with it. Does he go to a doctor? Does he just walk up to someone and declare himself crazy? That seems like a stupid idea.

But what else is there to do? He can hardly talk to Jessica, not after how he stormed out on her. And he doesn’t really want to talk to Jessica either. He really doesn’t feel any friendship for her of any kind. The understanding they had was for Sehun’s sake, so now that Sehun’s gone, there’s no more need for them to be friendly with each other.

He rakes his mind, trying to think of anyone he could talk to, but all his other friends are back in Korea, and he hardly feels like calling them up just to let them know how he’s going crazy. All because his best friend died. He’d never thought of himself as so mentally weak that he would break under something like that. But then he’d never thought Sehun would die, either. Not the always careful Sehun.

If anyone was more likely to die, it would have been him. He was always the one to not take to rules to heart too much. He was always the one walking in the middle of the street at night or drinking so much beer that he hardly remembered his own address. Sehun was calculated, had everything pre-planned. Sehun was his reason and he was Sehun’s adventure. That’s why they worked together so well. Because he was the crazy one and Sehun the calm one.

So, if anyone should’ve died, it should have been him.

And why the hell is he hearing those two Chinese guys? In fact, where have they come from? Sehun has literally never told him about a Luhan or a Kris, or even a Yifan. So why is he now seeing and hearing them almost everywhere he goes?

It’s that particular thought which pushes him to realisation. If anyone is going to be able to tell him if he’s gone insane or if he’s being … post-cognitive, then it’s going to be the guys he’s hearing. After all, if they have no recollection of these conversations, then he truly is insane. And if they do, then… Well, then he’s standing at the beginning of an entirely new life, isn’t he?

Taking a deep breath, he crawls out of bed so he can go get dressed. If he’s going to contact those guys, then he’s first going to have to find a way to do so. He remembers that Luhan guy writing down his phone number on a piece of paper in the hospital, but doesn’t remember for the life of him what he did with said piece of paper. Which is typical. Sehun would have known where to look. But Sehun is gone. Still, he tries to think like his best friend in hopes of finding the paper.

 

_“Come on, scarecrow, we’re going to find your dictionary. Where did you see it last?” Sehun chimes at him with a wide, amused grin on his face._

_“Seriously, dude, it’s two centimetres. Two frigging centimetres. If I’m a scarecrow you’re my two centimetre less tall fellow scarecrow, you know that?” He retaliates, sounding a little annoyed, but he’s already grinning as well by the time he finishes the sentence. Sehun lets out a laugh._

_“Sure thing, man. Scarecrow fellows for life. Now, where did you see your dictionary last?”_

_He looks around the room, trying to remember when he’d last seen said dictionary, but no particular occasion comes to mind. Except…_

_“Well, I remember when I first bought it…” He states, causing Sehun to let out another laugh. He can’t help but chuckle as well._

_“I swear to God if I would get a penny for every time you said something like that I’d be rich.” Sehun complains, only to add: “No, actually, on second thought, you’d probably just have spent all that money on fried chicken and beer.”_

_He grins even wider at the accusation. “Yep. I totally would have.” Throwing an arm around Sehun’s shoulders, he pets his best friend on the chest. “And you would have consumed both those things together with me so… You’re welcome.”_

_Sehun shoves him in the side. He pulls his friend along with him so they stumble through his room as the fight continues. They’re both grinning happily while shoving each other around. Eventually they stumble into his desk, causing several things to topple off it onto the floor. He spots an all too familiar looking book in between some of them._

_“Oh, hey, look! There it is!” He states triumphantly._

_“See, systematically looking for it pays of,” Sehun chimes. He gives his friend another shove, but they’re both laughing again._

 

No matter where he searches, he can’t seem to find the paper with the phone number on it. As if it’s disappeared without a trace. He tries to utilise every method Sehun has ever told him to use, but he still comes up empty handed. Tired and annoyed, he gives his desk chair a good kick, sending it rolling away through his room and crashing into the wall.

“Goddamnit!” The curse seems to hang in the emptiness of his room for a moment, before he follows it with an outcry of rage. “Fucking Luhan with your fucking paper! Just show up you stupid thing!” He shoves a pile of books off his desk in an attempt to find an outlet for all the frustration pent up inside of him, watching it topple over and down to the floor. It hardly satisfies him.

“Calm down, Chanyeol. I’m here.”

The voice startles him and he turns around immediately, hurling the first thing he could get his hands on in the direction of where the voice is coming from. Luhan – who’s leaning against his kitchenette like it’s no big deal – simply tilts his head to the side so the calculator slams into the cupboard and falls to the floor, harmless. Luhan looks down at it for a moment, before looking back up at him. Somehow the sorrows of the entire universe seem to suddenly rest on the young man’s shoulders.

“What do you need?”


	5. Fourth Trace

“I—You— How did you get here?” It’s all he can stammer, seeing Luhan standing inside of his room so suddenly. Has he been here all along? Was Luhan the one playing tricks on him.

The intruder’s expression changes to a slight frown, and he feels somehow bad for having disappointed Luhan. As always his feelings make no sense around the Chinese guy and he doesn’t even know why he thinks Luhan is disappointed. But the other male does push himself up from the kitchenette to stand straight.

“If you don’t know that yet, then I’m afraid I can’t help you,” he states, clearly intending to leave the room. That is something Chanyeol definitely can’t let him do, though, so he starts forward a step, lifting a hand as if to stop Luhan from leaving like that.

“No, wait. Who are you? And who is Yifan?”

Luhan’s eyes widen in surprise, his confident stance faltering for a moment as his eyes flick over to something on Chanyeol’s right. Before Chanyeol can even turns his head, another voice speaks up from behind him.

“So, you know my name…” It’s more of a statement than a question and when he looks over his left shoulder to see who’s standing there, he comes face to face with Kris again. Why is that guy always involved in everything? It bugs him to no end.

“What the hell are you doing here?” There is none of the shock left that he felt when Luhan had suddenly appeared. In fact, he feels nothing but anger and resentment towards this Yifan character. He can’t pinpoint which moment it was exactly that made him hate the man so much, though.

“Let me help you with that.” Kris – Yifan? – speaks and before he knows it, it’s like he’s being pulled under water. But instead of liquid filling his lungs when he gasps in surprise, it’s a memory that overtakes him. Not one of his memories, though. This one is too vivid, with a strange vibrant hue over it like a badly chosen snapchat filter.

 

_Sehun is standing across from him, but he barely recognises him at first glance. There is none of Sehun’s liveliness left and the expression his friend holds on his face is not one he is familiar with. A dangerous determination seems laced within every line of Sehun’s features and his eyes… His eyes are the darkest he’s ever seen them, like a pit of despair that opens to him just by looking at them. It’s almost terrifying, but somehow there is a blanket over his emotions, as if something’s shielding him from the horror of the sight._

_‘So we’ve come to an agreement then?’ He recognises the tone of voice Sehun’s using from the times he’d heard a ghost talking in his bedroom. So it wasn’t a ghost? It was a memory? He doesn’t get the time to think about it further, because his own mouth opens and he speaks in an all too familiar voice. Kris’ voice._

_‘We have, Oh Sehun.’ His body reaches out a hand and he watches how Sehun takes it and shakes it. The hand belongs to Yifan, he realises with a start. He’s watching from within Yifan’s body. A moment of conversation between the man and Sehun. But how do they know each other? How did they get to this moment? What are they agreeing about? He doesn’t get much time to think about that either, because Yifan speaks again._

_‘You voluntarily give me your life so that I can save that of your friend.’_

_‘Best friend,’ Sehun corrects the taller male and Chanyeol can’t help but feel smug because of it. At least he isn’t the only one who’s not so fond of Yifan. And if Sehun doesn’t like the guy either then there must be a proper reason for it. Probably the fact that he’s taken Sehun’s life. That sounds like a good enough reason any day._

_‘The life of your best friend,” Yifan simply repeats himself with the slight alteration. “In return for your help, I must allow Luhan to intervene within Chanyeol’s life as well for the coming year, so that he can help me to make it better.’_

_‘Exactly.” Sehun agrees, nodding shortly and then letting go of Yifan’s hand. A small smile has appeared on his face, almost bright enough to remind Chanyeol of Sehun’s usual expression. But there’s still something missing. He only realises after a moment what that something is, and it hits him like a jolt of electricity. Him. He is missing. Sehun’s making a deal with Yifan to save his life._

 

“What the hell!?” He blurts out, right as Luhan darts forward with an almost desperate: “No!” Before Luhan’s hands can even touch him, Yifan has stepped in between them, catching Luhan in his hold and pulling him against himself.

“I’m sorry, Lu. He wanted to know. There was nothing I could do about it. Free will.” It’s spoken in a much softer tone than Chanyeol has ever heard coming from the Chinese man, but despite the warmth in his voice, Luhan still sags in the hold as if he’s just been given the most devastating news. He knows the feeling all too well, which is probably the only reason why he recognises the emotion on the fair male’s face.

“You can’t, Yifan, you can’t,” Luhan almost pleads and it sounds like he’s about to burst out into tears. But his eyes remain dry as his gaze focuses on the taller man. “It wasn’t your fault. It was mine. I should have to pay, not you. You can’t do this. Please.”

Chanyeol watches how Luhan’s hands grab hold of Yifan’s arms, but the taller male seems unresponsive to the clear pain in Luhan’s voice. For the first time, Chanyeol notes belatedly, he doesn’t feel any anger towards the man anymore. There even is something hopeful inside of him, as if Yifan has brought him back a piece of light.

“It’s alright, Luhan. It was always my responsibility to bear.” Chanyeol watches in bewilderment as Kris places a soft kiss on Luhan’s hair. “Now remember, you can’t refuse him, alright? Remember your promise. You will do anything to protect him, to keep him safe. You have to do this.”

Luhan doesn’t respond in words anymore, but his gaze remains on Yifan with a pleading expression for a few moments longer. Until Yifan lets go of the guy and takes a step away, squaring his shoulders and taking in a slow breath. Only when he’s breathed it all back out does he turn around, allowing Chanyeol to look at his face again.

It’s an almost emotionless expression that faces him, but somehow Chanyeol is sure that he can see a spark of relief there. It’s nothing much, just a little tilt of one of the corners of Yifan’s mouth and a softness to the gaze in his eyes, but Chanyeol spots it nonetheless. His eyes dart over the other male’s face, trying to find an explanation for the absurdity of his entire situation, trying to find whatever it is that seems to connect him to this man so much that his emotions are so badly influenced.

He finds nothing. But when he levels his gaze with Yifan’s again, the taller male starts to smile. Warmly, almost as if they’re long lost friends.

“Oh, no no no, you’re not smiling at me like that.” He instantly sets off. “You better give me a damn good explanation for what the hell’s going on and what the hell you’re doing here in my room all of a sudden. Neither of you two used the freaking door!”

All his tirade does is make Yifan smile wider. “It’s good to have the usual you back, Chanyeol,” the Chinese male speaks and somehow it soothes him a little. “I assure you that we’ll give you an explanation. Although I don’t think you’ll find it ‘damn good.’”

He swallows hard, then glances past Yifan at Luhan, who stands a few steps further away, shoulders hanging, clearly defeated. His eyes return to Yifan’s face. “Alright, start talking.”

 

The silence in his dorm room is heavy, thick with the lack of understanding that is apparent in every single part of Chanyeol’s face.

“Wait…” He finally manages to bring out, staggering over from his position at his desk until he feels the bed against his legs and flops down on it. “You’re telling me…” He can’t manage to finish the sentence, so he just goes quiet again, gaze moving in between the two Chinese men in his room.

“It’s true.” Luhan finally speaks then. Chanyeol watches how the man steps closer until he’s standing next to Yifan. Their hands seem to find each other automatically and Chanyeol sees how Yifan gives the shorter male’s hand a reassuring squeeze. Luhan clears his throat. “Because I asked Yifan to spend time with me that night, he wasn’t there to protect you. That’s why, when the drunk guy toppled into you, there was nothing from stopping you of going over the balcony railing.”

“It wasn’t Sehun who originally died, Chanyeol, it was you.” Yifan adds after a moment, as if the graveness of the situation hasn’t yet dawned on him. His eyes dart in between the two men again, trying to find the hint of a smile or the beginning of laughter, trying to find any sign of this all being a sick joke. There is no sign of anything to the likes. Which can only mean one thing.

The two Chinese guys are just as insane as he is. If not more.

“Get out,” he almost growls. “Get the fuck out of my room. None of this is funny. You’re clearly insane. You’re delusional. You’re fucking sadists!” He lunges for Yifan but before his hands can even touch the man, they’re gone. He stumbles forward through the air, the strength of his momentum sending him tumbling towards the ground, where he crashes onto the carpet.

He lies there for a moment, trying to process everything that has just happened to him, but the sadness floods him before he can even get a grasp on the situation. It’s not long before the sobs start wrecking through him. He gives in to the emptiness and the ache inside of him easily, crying on the floor of his dorm room until his throat feels hoarse and his head throbs with the pressure of all his sniffling.

 

He wakes up later that day with a heavy head, filled with all kinds of information that he still can’t make sense of. It takes one look at his watch to decide to just skip classes, because it’s not like he’s going to remember anything they’re going to try and teach him that day anyway. In fact, he’ll be surprised if he’s even going to understand a single word of English with the way his head is still throbbing.

A good shower, a nice breakfast and a freshly made cup of coffee later, he sits behind his computer, opening a Google page. He wonders for a while what he’ll search for, but then he starts typing. He opens the first hit for his search term, reads half a page and then decides the better of it. He goes back to Google to find a dictionary instead.

guardian angel  
noun

Definition of guardian angel  
: an angel believed to watch and protect someone  
: a helpful or protective person

Staring at the definition of guardian angel for a long while, he allows his mind to remember the things Yifan has told him. How the two Chinese males are actually guardian angels, his and Sehun’s respectively. How Luhan, Sehun’s guardian angel, had asked Yifan, his own guardian angel, to spend some time together, because it had been a long time since they’d been able to. That had been the reason Yifan hadn’t been around Chanyeol to prevent his unfortunate fall down the balcony from happening.

Normally, Yifan had stated, he should have felt something whenever Chanyeol was in risk of danger, but this time the tall male hadn’t sensed anything. And so they’d only found out of his fate when it was too late already, when he’d already taken the several storey plunge down to the earth. Cue Sehun’s disbelief and heartbreak, his sadness and despair and then, eventually, his cunning.

Sehun had apparently long figured out guardian angels were a thing and had started searching the entire internet and even libraries trying to find anything that could help him get in touch with them. And he’d managed. Exactly the conversation Chanyeol had overheard at Sehun’s room after he’d bolted from Jessica in the Starbucks. And Sehun had made a deal with Yifan. The only way for Yifan to turn back Chanyeol’s death had been with someone else’s life. An illegal act unless the life was willingly given.

And of course the stupid scarecrow of an asshat would have offered his life willingly in order to save Chanyeol. So that’s why he had stayed home that fateful day and Sehun had gone to party; because Sehun had made their guardian angels reverse their roles. And that’s why he hated Yifan so much; because Yifan is the reason Sehun is dead. Because Yifan has taken Sehun’s life to trade it for Chanyeol’s. And Chanyeol has never wanted to be the reason for Sehun’s death. Ever.

But alas, here he is, sitting behind his computer, googling guardian angels because he was too careless and had toppled over a balcony. If the situation wasn’t so damn bleak he would have probably laughed with Sehun about the silliness of his own death. Who falls down a balcony, really? Especially when there is a railing. Only Park Chanyeol can be that stupid, obviously. How has he ever even believed something like that would happen to Sehun?

But – he realises with a start – if Sehun made a deal with Yifan to get his life back, then all he needs to do is make his own deal. Suddenly Yifan’s words make sense.

_‘Now remember, you can’t refuse him, alright? Remember your promise. You will do anything to protect him, to keep him safe. You have to do this.’_

Just as much as Yifan took Sehun’s life willingly to trade it for Chanyeol’s, there was someone who would willingly do the exact opposite. And that someone was none other than…

“Luhan!”


	6. The End

He turns on his chair to look around, finding Luhan standing a little end away from him, looking at him with that same sorrowful expression as the Chinese male sported before. Getting up from his chair, Chanyeol instantly straightens, ready to make his demands from the guardian angel. But Luhan lifts a hand before he can say anything and he is rendered to silence. Still the Chinese male has exceptional influence on him, because he is a hard man to keep quiet.

“You dislike Yifan so much because, even though he saved your life, he used Sehun’s to do it,” Luhan states and the words make sense to him. It also explains why he’s been less angry at the taller male, because Yifan has started to try and save Sehun instead. “You are so alright with me because I am Sehun’s guardian angel and I’m supposed to keep Sehun safe and I have always tried to do exactly that.”

Luhan takes a breath and Chanyeol knows more is going to come, but for some reason he suddenly turns reluctant to hear the rest, as if he knows what’s coming. “What we do and do not do to Sehun affects you so much because he is, in fact, your soulmate.” Another word he’d have to google in order to fully come to terms with its existence, most probably. Luhan is still not done talking, though. “In every lifetime, you two will look for each other until you’ve found each other. In every lifetime the one will miss the other when they’re not around.”

This, Chanyeol realises, is why Luhan is telling him anything at all. “Even if you do what it is you are thinking of doing, Sehun’s life will not be complete.” Chanyeol watches the shorter male struggle to swallow, but his tone of voice remains as calm as can be. “Yifan and I have another year or more together because of the deal Sehun made with him. However, if you make a deal with me, that time is up. Either you reinstate me as Sehun’s guardian and Yifan fades, or you do nothing and we both fade.”

It’s too much to wrap his head around, really, he can’t fathom why on earth either of the Chinese men would ‘fade.’ But it’s as if Luhan can sense his confusion, because he doesn’t even have to ask for the male to explain it better. “A guardian angel cannot stay in this world without anyone to guard. We are currently your guardian angels. If you die, we will both fade. Only if you make a deal with me to guard Sehun again will I be able to stay.” A moment of quiet, Luhan hardening himself for the words he needs to say, Chanyeol just trying to comprehend it all. “But Yifan will fade no matter what.”

“Can’t I just make a deal so that you both can stay with Sehun?”

Luhan smiles, clearly amused by the implications of his question, but also a little sad. “However nice that is of you to do, you can only ask for one thing in return.”

They stand there, Chanyeol looking at Luhan, Luhan looking back at him. Suddenly Yifan appears as well, right next to Luhan. Chanyeol jumps in surprise, grabbing at his chest when his heart starts racing. “Dude! Don’t do that to me! You’re going to kill me with a heart attack and then everything has been for nothing!”

The words make Yifan smile. It’s only the second time Chanyeol sees this kind of genuine smile on his face. He realises the tall Chinese man – guardian angel? – is heavily influenced by Chanyeol’s emotions towards him. He figures it must have something to do with the guardian angel bond thing, then feels a little guilty for having made it so hard on this man for the past weeks in which he’d been trying to cope with the loss of Sehun.

Then again, who is he kidding, he’d been able to cope with absolutely nothing.

 

_“You and I, we’re going to be friends for a long time, right?” A tiny, 6-year-old Sehun utters this question to his older, cooler friend. 7-year-old Chanyeol nods his head fervently, plopping himself down on the cobblestones next to Sehun and taking hold of his hand._

_“We’re gonna be friends forever.” He says with all the conviction he feels inside of him. Sehun looks up at him with wide, trusting eyes and Chanyeol smiles back down at him with all the brazenness of a young boy who hasn’t been cheated by life yet._

 

That evening, he finds himself sitting in a chair next to his window, staring out into the cold December night. It’s almost Christmas, he realises after a while, musing on the meaning of the Holiday, remembering all the years he’s spent that holiday together with Sehun. Their parents hadn’t needed long to give up the idea of a one-family Christmas, because Chanyeol and Sehun had always wanted to be together. So Christmas had become a large gathering of two families for the rest of their lives.

Now one of the two pillars of that union is gone. The thought renders him to tears once more, although he tries to hold them at bay. They still brim in his eyes. Sehun is dead, because Chanyeol died and Sehun didn’t want to leave it at that. So how can he do anything other than save Sehun’s life in return? He honestly can’t imagine life without Sehun anyway. Already Berlin doesn’t interest him anymore, and he knows going home is not going to spark his enthusiasm.

The spark of his enthusiasm is and always has been Sehun. Small, innocent Sehun. Lanky, bullied Sehun. Tall, serious Sehun. The boy he met in kindergarten has grown up into such a wonderful, honest and meticulous young man, always ready to help a friend when necessary. And Chanyeol is the reason all of that is gone now. The guilt is almost too much to bear, but the thought of never being able to spend another moment with Sehun is even worse.

The cold December night breeze caresses his cheeks, highlighting the paths of the tears that have managed to roll down after all. Chanyeol doesn’t mind, doesn’t care that someone who passes by in the street below might look up and see him sitting there. The backlight from his room would make it unable for them to see his tears anyway. He hopes. But then again it doesn’t matter what anyone thinks. It won’t be long before none of this is real anymore and Sehun will have taken his place.

_‘Sehun’s life will not be complete.’_

He remembers Luhan say those words and feels even more guilty. All because he had to be so stupid as to slip in a puddle and fall over a balcony railing. All because of him, there is now no way either of them can be happy anymore. Because one of them will have to die. He doesn’t know if it’s fair, doesn’t know if he still thinks life is as good as you make it. That’s what he’s always believed, but if there are things like soulmates and guardian angels, then some part of it has nothing to do with you at all, doesn’t it?

Then, a new thought hits him. If he gives his life so that Luhan can bring Sehun back, will Sehun feel the same way he does now? Lost, and confused, and alone. No, Sehun would have an easier time, right? Surely someone as matter-of-fact as Sehun would find a way to move on and be happy again. He remembers the look on Luhan’s face when he said those words and feels the little fragment of hope he’d talked into himself die out again instantly.

He doesn’t want Sehun to have to feel the way he is feeling now. He doesn’t want Sehun to settle for Jessica when he can get so much better, just because Chanyeol’s not there to convince him of it. He doesn’t want Sehun to have to struggle to find a way to cope, when there is no way to cope with the loss of someone who’s been at your side for over twenty years. No one wants a life like that. Not even Sehun.

He makes a decision then, sitting at his window watching Berlin by night. So he pushes himself up from the chair, closing his window and turning away to go to bed. He doesn’t have to tell anyone tonight, they can wait until tomorrow. He can sleep another night about it. Although he’s pretty sure his mind is made up, sleep can never hurt.

 

“You what?” Luhan looks at him incredulously, but with a hint of hopeful relief already in his expression. Yifan’s face is unreadable, but the set of his jaw is tense and Chanyeol’s pretty sure that it’s discontent cramping the taller man’s muscles.

“I’m not making any deal. I can’t. If I do, Sehun will just be forced to live this kind of life in my place. I’m the one who was stupid enough to die, means I’m the one who should bear the consequences. He can have a new life now, right? He’s moving on and starting again. Reincarnation or something. Or he’s up there watching me fail? Whatever it is, as long as he’s good, I don’t want to pull him out of it and bring him back down here just to try and live a life that’s never going to be fulfilling anyway.”

Luhan’s eyes sparkle. Yifan looks like maybe there is a drop of moisture more in his. But just a drop. They’re both quiet, so Chanyeol just continues talking. “You said neither of our lives would ever be complete without the other. I don’t want that for him. I don’t want that for anyone but especially not for him. So I’ll do it. I’ll live, like he wanted to be the case. I’ll carry the weight. And then in the next life I’ll be less careless.” He breathes, composes himself and then suddenly feels apologetic. “I’m sorry you guys will only have another year or something together, though.”

The weight of an entire body crushes his chest for a second when Yifan – not Luhan but Yifan? – flings himself at him and pulls him into a hug. He quickly wraps his arms around the taller male too, patting his back reassuringly even though he is completely baffled as to why Yifan would do something like that. His gaze finds Luhan’s over Yifan’s shoulder. The shorter male is looking at him with a smile even though there are tears threatening to spill.

“Thank you.” Luhan speaks softly, but Chanyeol can understand him perfectly. “I can’t tell you how much this means. Thank you.” He nods to show the angel he understood, then focuses on Yifan again, who’s still clinging on to him.

“So, uh… I thought you and Luhan were a thing, or did I get that wrong?” He utters, amusement as well as confusion shining through in his voice. “So maybe you should be doing this to him, not me. I mean… I’m cool, but… Maybe he’s going to get jealous, you know.” Yifan produces a sound that suddenly alerts Chanyeol of the fact that the tall male is crying. Crying? Oh god, waterworks. Not the waterworks. He hates waterworks.

Instantly he becomes awkward, patting the male on his back some more but having no idea what else to do. Luckily Yifan pulls away from him after another moment, hiding his face as he turns away and disappears again. Luhan, however, still reaches out an arm and puts it around an invisible shape, gently moving his hand up and down over what Chanyeol presumes is supposed to be someone’s arm.

“Now you guys are invisible too?” He sputters when he realises what that means. “Don’t tell me you’ve been spying on me all the time.” Holding his hands in front of his chest, he gives Luhan an incredulous look. The Chinese male only smiles a bit wider and warmer at him.

“I’m sorry,” is the response he gets. “But don’t worry, we looked away every time you were naked. So we didn’t do that much looking in total.”

It’s a joke, Chanyeol realises after a moment, and he starts to grin. Luhan grins back, his smile so bright and infectious that soon Chanyeol is chuckling and then laughing. It’s the first time he’s been able to since Sehun has gone. Having Luhan around, he realises, is a little like having a piece of Sehun around. And that’s exactly why Sehun has made the deal for Luhan to take care of him too. To make it easier on him to have lost Sehun.

For a second his smile falters at that thought, but then his eyes meet Luhan’s and the understanding he finds there makes it just that little bit easier to accept the truth of it all.

“I have one condition, though,” he speaks then, instantly getting both men’s attention. How he knows that when he can’t even see Yifan, he doesn’t know, but he’s certain they’re both focused on him now. “I’m going back to Korea. I can’t hear any more German without going crazy.”

 

The plane ride is long, but he figures he can’t really have expected anything less considering how far it is from Germany back to Korea. Luckily there are not many complications and he just has to keep himself busy for the hours he’s stuck in his window seat. He’s glad he didn’t pick the aisle seat because the guy next to him has already gotten up over twenty times most probably and the girl next to him has had to get up along with him every time to let him pass.

Turning his gaze to look outside again, Chanyeol sees the clouds spread out beneath them. But what’s more is that there’s smoke too. Black smoke twirling over the wing and—Wait a second! Black smoke? Something’s on fire? Instantly his eyes flick over to the intercom above his head, but he’s pretty sure no message has been made yet.

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking.” Oh, yes, of course, just his luck. “We seem to be having some trouble with one of our engines and will be making an emergency landing. Please return to your seat and put your seatbelt on. Please stay calm. In case of emergency, use your oxygen masks and safety vests as instructed at the start of this flight.”

The wave of panic almost visible washes over the plane. Chanyeol can feel the two people in the seats next to him tense up, ready to start praying to every God they believe in, most probably. Surprisingly he doesn’t feel anything like that himself. He’s completely calm, as if nothing in the world can harm him. Well, he has two guardian angels now, of course. So if something still happens to him now they would be exceptionally bad at their jobs, wouldn’t they?

The plane starts descending and Chanyeol sits quietly in his seat, looking outside at how they move through the clouds and then closer and closer to the ground. As the ride down starts to become bumpy, the rest of the passengers become restless. When the motor truly catches fire, people start shouting and panicking. The stewards try to do everything to make sure people stay calm, but chaos ensues.

Chanyeol still feels as calm as if his plane is not going down to a certain doom. When the oxygen masks come down and he calmly helps the guy next to him put his on first, he is given a frantic look as if the male can’t understand how he’s staying so calm under this. He makes sure to first explain to the woman in front of him how to put the oxygen mask on her kid properly before he puts his own on. Then he turns to look outside again. He watches the ground come closer, and closer, and closer.

The noise is deafening, so deafening that it suddenly seems quiet. The entire plane trembles and creaks, breaking at the impact when they finally meet with the ground. Chanyeol watches the chaos around him with a feeling of detachment, looking at how everyone is trying to make their way out of the emergency exits as quickly as possible, watches the shock register on the stewards faces when something is being said over their earpiece. He turns his head to the window again just in time to see the second explosion ignite, right at the base of the wing next to him.

He doesn’t feel any pain.


	7. The Aftermath

He’s at a party. One look at his surroundings tells him the party is in Berlin. He doesn’t recognise the place he’s at, though. A vaguely familiar person waves at him from amidst the crowd. When the girl comes closer, he recognises her as Amanda, the girl from his Thursday afternoon classes. It’s when she’s leaning in to give him a kiss on his cheek that he remembers her inviting him to a party at her place. He grins brightly at her, his arms spread as the excitement blooms inside of him.

“I’m ready to party!” He exclaims and Amanda laughs, offering him a beer. He takes it willingly, and it sure isn’t the last beer he’s having. Amanda’s place is big and beautiful, with a wonderful view of the city. Her friends are the nicest people and her boyfriend is nice, too. Tall, handsome man with a friendly smile and a sort of easy charm that you can’t help but like. Chanyeol definitely likes the guy.

The drinking continues, so does the music. Eventually they retreat to the balcony to get some fresh air. It’s high time, really, because everything’s getting a little hazy for him. Breathing in deeply, he allows the air to escape his lungs at a slow and steady pace, focusing his eyes on Berlin’s skyline. It feels familiar, being there, a certain sense of déjà vu taking over him. But he can’t pinpoint exactly why, as if the rest of his knowledge is fumbled and hidden away.

When he turns his head to look at the rest of the group again, he sees one of them take a step backwards. His eyes spot the water puddle at the edge of the balcony, then next they spot the way the balcony railing doesn’t look all that trustworthy. He vaguely remembers Amanda saying something along the lines of ‘don’t lean against it, it probably won’t hold.’ Time seems to come to a slow as he checks who the person is and he spots the familiar lines of the side of Florian’s face – Amanda’s boyfriend.

Instinct kicks in as he steps forward, right into the puddle, catching Florian’s weight against him and shoving him back towards the building, away from the railing. But his feet don’t find the proper footing within the puddle of water and the weight of Florian crashing into him pushes him off balance. His drunken state doesn’t do much to help with that either. He hears surprised cries from the people he’s probably shoved Florian into, which then turn into horrified screams when his own body collides with the railing and it cracks loudly.

He topples over, feels like he becomes weightless for a second as he falls through the air. When he passes by a downstairs window, he sees his own face reflected in the glass. Sehun’s eyes look back at him, piercing through his very soul for a split second, before they become his own eyes again. He forgets how to breathe for a second because of the shock of seeing Sehun’s face, then collides with the street. It doesn’t hurt as much as it’s supposed to, he figures it’s because he’s in shock.

Gingerly, he tries to push himself up into a somewhat sitting position. Right as he manages to lift his head up slightly, he is faced with a bright light. The end of the road perhaps? But he soon figures out it’s a car’s headlights when the bumper collides with him, sending the car upwards. No matter the driver’s pull on the steering wheel, the tires come back down to the ground, right above him. He thinks he hears someone yell out his name in a panic, then whatever ‘he’ is, is gone.

 

He opens his eyes, but has to blink a few times to get the mist out of them. It takes him a few more blinks to realise the mist is all around him, not just in his eyes. One look down tells him he’s even standing on the mist-like substance, so it can’t really be mist, because mist certainly doesn’t hold a person’s weight. He remembers the strange dream he just had, then realises it’s not a dream when the memory of his own death finally comes back to him.

Then comes the memory of how Sehun had apparently taken his place and he had had to live without him. Then comes the memory of his second death, when the plane he’d been in on his way home had exploded with him in it. He thinks of his parents as well as Sehun’s, finding it a cruel fate that they would have to lose both their children so early on in life. He thinks of how no one in the neighbourhood is ever going to let their children go to Europe again in their entire lives because of this.

“Always thinking of others…” A voice speaks from behind him and he twirls around on the balls of his feet to see who it is talking to him. The man standing there feels familiar, but he doesn’t quite recognise him until a moment later.

“Florian?” His tone is incredulous, watching the man walk closer to him over the mist-like underground. A hearty laugh comes from Amanda’s boyfriend.

“Just his face, I’m afraid.” The male opposite of him is speaking perfectly understandable and unaccented Korean, and Chanyeol is positively freaked out a little. “I have no real shape so I am usually assigned a neutral but familiar shape from the lifetime of whichever person I come across here.” Chanyeol’s face must look like he has no clue what the hell the man’s going on about, because he truly _has_ no clue what the man is going on about. Another laugh sparks from the male. “I am the guardian of souls, the one who protects them and helps them on to their next life.”

That really doesn’t clarify the case any bit more to Chanyeol, but he still makes a polite face of understanding. Florian laughs once more and Chanyeol presumes he can’t really get any thought or emotion past the guy in this dream-like place. “You’re here because you’ve died, Park Chanyeol.” Well, that part he can understand, but he is curious about something.

“The first time, or the second time?” He questions, causing Florian’s smile to turn warm and a little mischievous.

“Both.” Oh. Great. That makes total sense. “The first time you died, you did so in trying to save someone else. Commendable. Not many people would. The second time you died, however, you did so after you had decided to live to save someone else the heartache and pain. Now there is something that even less people would do. Most of the ones making your kind of decision would try to end the pain themselves, trying to leave the life behind after all.” Chanyeol huffs a little because, well, the life is ended anyway. Florian smiles. “In your case it was bad luck, I guess.”

“You think?” Chanyeol immediately deadpans, earning himself another hearty laugh from the male he’s with. Florian clears his throat a moment later, however, and hums.

“You’ve given up a happy life in order to save your friend a painful life that had in its turn already been given to save your life which you had given to save Florian’s life.” Chanyeol’s head is swimming and he can hear Florian laugh again. But the sound is not agitating. The man actually feels warm, like family almost. As if he’s been around him before.

“Oh all the time,” Florian agrees. “You have a habit of giving your life for people. They usually don’t have a habit of returning the favour, though. First time a living soul has figured out about guardian angels on his own as well, by the way. Quite a commendable fellow, that Oh Sehun.” The name sparks a warmth inside of Chanyeol’s very being that catches him by surprise. “You two seem to be made for each other, hmm?”

The hum pulls Chanyeol’s attention back to the other male, expression turning into a frown. “What am I doing here?” He asks, and Florian smiles warmly again, this time without any hint of the mischievousness.

“We are at a point of return, my dear Chanyeol. You have successfully walked the path of a time changer. Where we are now you have two choices. Well, three actually. On the one hand, you can go back to life, to the point of your first death, only you don’t die obviously. In doing so you give yourself, your friend and your two guardian angels a chance to continue the life you were in.”

Florian leaves a pause before continuing, as if giving him the time to take in his first option. “On the other hand, you can move on to the next life. We go on from the point of your second death so your friend doesn’t have to suffer a life alone either. You all move on to the next life, start a new adventure, slates wiped clean.” Another short pause. “The last option is that you stay here with me for a while, because I’m such great company and only move on after a while.”

Chanyeol blinks, another déjà vu feeling hitting him. Without really knowing why, he states: “I’ve done that last one before, haven’t I?” Florian smiles back at him, that same warm expression as before. “Oh yes you have. Plenty of times. We’ve spent many a time together, Park Chanyeol.”

He smiles at the thought, feeling content to know that he’s a sort of friends with the man opposite of him. He thinks about his options then, a sense of calmness taking him over as he does. He no longer feels like a teenager, he just feels peaceful. “Before you decide,” Florian interrupts his thoughts, and the man’s smiling mischievously again. “I’ll allow you to discuss this with the other person involved. Because I know that otherwise you will tell me you can’t decide for him.”

 

He stands in limbo. It’s a sudden realisation that hits him when Florian has disappeared and he’s left on his own to wait for ‘the other person involved.’ He’s not quite sure who he’s going to be able to talk to, because there are three other people involved as far as he’s concerned. Unless, of course, the guardian angels don’t qualify as people. In that case he is meeting Sehun. Again his very core seems to warm up at the mere thought of the other male and a small smile already tugs at his lips.

“Chanyeol.” The voice is unmistakably Sehun’s, causing him to turn faster than he has ever done. There, across from him, is indeed his best friend, looking at him in clear surprise. “What… How are you here?”

He realises that Sehun doesn’t know yet what has transpired between him and Florian. The guardian of souls, he should say because Amanda’s boyfriend has nothing to do with this. Before he can start to explain, however, Sehun’s face turns confused at first and then his expression settles into a warm smile as well. Chanyeol doesn’t need to be able to read minds to know Sehun’s been informed, feeling quite the same because of it as he is himself right now.

“You…” Sehun speaks again, coming closer to him. He doesn’t waste any time in wrapping his arms around his best friend, pulling him into a tight hug. The feeling is so familiar yet not, because of the place they’re in at that moment. But the warmth in his very core spreads until it seems to comfortably cover every part of him up to his fingertips. Sehun’s holding him back just as tightly, their faces pressed into each other’s shoulder.

“I missed you,” Chanyeol states, thinking of the month and a half he’d spent without Sehun in his life, but almost automatically the feeling seems to spread itself out over a way longer time than that, over multiple lifetimes, over the entire existence of his being. Sehun doesn’t say anything, but he can feel his friend agree, their connection apparently transcending the spoken word in that moment. Standing there like that for a long time, Chanyeol eventually pulls away again, looking at his friend with a small smile.

“I was told I have to make a decision. Go back or move on.” His eyes find Sehun’s, taking in the familiar colour and shape. “What do you think?”

Sehun’s quiet for a while, clearly thinking about the options, trying to figure out whether it would be better for them to move on, or to go back and finish that life they were living. It was a good life, Chanyeol has to admit to himself, he was very good with Sehun. He vaguely remembers the feeling of other lives and just knows somehow that it has been the first time in long that they have been such a big part of each other’s lives.

It’s something he doesn’t really want to give up on, but he feels like Sehun should have just as much of a say in it as he does. If the younger male doesn’t want to go back to that life and prefers starting a new one, then Chanyeol will go with him. He doesn’t know why he’s so sure of that, but he just is. He is not going anywhere on his own, that’s for sure. Either Sehun’s with him, or it’s not happening.

As if in the back of his head, he can hear Florian’s warm laughter echo again, realising only now that it’s an expression of the man’s fondness over their close bond. It makes him feel a little lighter in his chest, knowing that Florian is rooting for them, as if more certain that no actual harm will ever come to them just because the other male is there. Well, to be fair it’s not actually a male, of course, Florian is simply their Guardian.

“I don’t know…” Sehun speaks, instantly gaining Chanyeol’s attention again. “I feel like we should go back. There’s something I still wanted to do in that life and I don’t know if I will have the opportunity in a next one.” Chanyeol hums and nods, then becomes acutely aware of the fact that they also have to decide whether or not they want to remember what has transpired or whether they want to just forget it all and live the life as they would have if they hadn’t come here.

Chanyeol knows he wants to remember, but he doesn’t know if it’s a good idea to do so. Everything will change because of the newly garnered knowledge he has. And so he looks over at Sehun again, to see how his soulmate feels about it.


	8. Life

The first thing he becomes aware of is the continuous beeping. The almost rhythmical sound calms him down significantly and he matches his breathing to go with it. Eventually he opens his eyes, blinking a few times to allow his eyes to adjust to the light and brightness of the room. He’s fast to realise where he is, spotting the hospital machinery next to his bed the next moment. A frown creases his forehead as he tries to remember why the hell he’s in the hospital.

A nurse enters his room right that moment, stopping in her tracks at the sight of him and letting out a stream of surprised … German? Right. German. He’s been studying in Berlin with Sehun for the past couple months. The rest of the present reality catches up with him too and he remembers the party at Amanda’s place and the puddle of water at the edge of the balcony. He remembers falling to the ground and the car coming right for him.

“What?” He manages to croak, hoping the nurse will understand that he doesn’t speak frigging German. “What’s going on?”

“Chanyeol!” His name has never held so much relief before in his lifetime. Not even that one time when his mother had found him again after having lost him for half an hour when he’d run off into the bushes. He turns his head over to the owner of the voice, coming face to face with Sehun. There are bags under his best friend’s eyes, as well as the distinct look of sorrow that he knows comes with great worry over someone else. That someone’s probably him.

“Sehun…” He states, starting to smile, already reaching out a hand towards the other male. He doesn’t have to reach far, though, because Sehun sort of projectiles himself towards the bed. _Onto_ the bed, he realises a moment later when Sehun’s weight has sort of crashed onto him. There are arms tightly wrapped around his head – probably because his body is pressed into the hospital bed so it’s harder to take hold of – and a knee poking into his lower thigh.

He laughs, then coughs because his throat doesn’t seem to have been used lately. “Okay…” He states. “I presume I am not that badly hurt if you think it’s no problem for you to catapult yourself onto me.” He instantly feels Sehun starting to pull away, the start of an apology already on the younger male’s lips, so he quickly wraps his arms around his friend’s lithe built, keeping him close. “That’s good.”

It takes a moment for Sehun to relax again. Chanyeol smiles brightly the moment he does. “I’m never letting you go to a party alone again,” Sehun states harshly, and Chanyeol just laughs again, letting go of his friend so Sehun can straighten up and he can look at him. “I’m serious,” Sehun stresses, and his expression has indeed turned serious – and angry.

“Hey, hey,” Chanyeol instantly, raising his arms a little in a defensive manner. “I was just trying to save someone’s life, okay? That worked out, didn’t it?”

“Sure as hell it did,” Sehun agrees, motioning over to the flowers, get well soon cards and balloons that are spread out to the right of him. He grins at the sight, then pointedly looks at Sehun.

“I told you I have many admirers.” The groan of displeasure that comes from his younger friend is far from as sharp as it would usually have been, but he still gets hit on the arm and a dirty look is still given. All he can do is laugh, and it doesn’t take long for Sehun to start grinning as well, soon laughing too.

Their mirth is interrupted when the nurse from earlier returns with a doctor, probably to check him out and make sure he is really alright.

 

A good hour later they are finally alone again. He’s been informed that aside from the scrapes and bruises, he miraculously hasn’t broken anything at all. The car that came for him after he fell from the balcony had managed to brake right on time and he’d just been out with a small concussion for the rest of the night, the next day and night and a small part of the morning. They want to do some more tests to make sure he is truly alright, but he should be able to leave the hospital the next day.

He doesn’t know if it’s a good idea to leave the hospital, though, because Sehun has mentioned his parents are coming over and he’s pretty sure his mother is going to kill him for his incaution. When he tells Sehun this, the laughter that barks out of the younger male is enough to brighten his entire day and he grins back widely, more than happy with the fact that Sehun’s with him and looking so much better than he’d done just an hour ago.

“You know I—” He starts, but is interrupted by Sehun. His mind blanks out. For a few very long moments he’s convinced that he’s having another concussion, or maybe it’s a heart attack. The feeling he has is very close to the shock he felt after falling down a balcony, after all. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he vaguely hears someone talk as if in a dream. _‘I don’t think I’d want to remember. I don’t know if I’ll have the courage to do what I wanted to do if I remember.’_ And then it hits him; he is being kissed. By Sehun. In the hospital.

Kissed.

By Sehun.

Sehun!

His lack of response is probably what alarms the younger male, because Sehun pulls away again, a sheepish look on his face that Chanyeol has never seen before. He realises a split second later that that is because they’ve never felt embarrassed around each other, but that is exactly what Sehun’s feeling right now. Staring at his friend, he tries to come up with something to say, but he can’t even get his eyes to move, let alone his mouth.

“I…” Sehun stutters. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what… Uh…” Sehun’s pulling further away, starting to move off his bed and everything. Somehow the idea that Sehun feels uncomfortable around him now is what finally manages to push him back into movement. He reaches out and takes hold of Sehun’s wrist, tugging him back into his seated position on the edge of the bed.

“It’s okay,” he finally manages to say, locking his gaze with that of his best friend. Soulmate, he corrects himself, and that’s when he starts to smile. Too brightly, probably. Too much like a stupid idiot as well, probably. But he doesn’t care. He’s never felt embarrassed about anything around Sehun and he’s not about to start, either. “I don’t mind.”

His grin widens when he sees Sehun’s eyes search his face to figure out if what he says is really true or just something said to make sure the younger male won’t feel bad about it. So he shrugs lightly and adds: “I’m just glad I won’t have to watch you get together with Jessica.”

Instantly Sehun’s brow starts furrowing again, but Chanyeol doesn’t leave him the time for a reply, leaning in himself this time and covering Sehun’s lips with his own. For a long moment Sehun sits rigid, but Chanyeol allows him the time to process what’s going on and patiently waits for Sehun to respond to the kiss.

He’s not entirely prepared for how Sehun’s hands are on the sides of his face instantly and he is pulled into a deep kiss the moment he does, however. But he doesn’t complain. He’s not entirely sure where this change in relationship is going to take them, but something inside of him tells him it’s going to be far. Very far. Lifetimes and lifetimes ahead.

 

Someone clears their throat, causing Sehun to instantly break apart from him. He moves his head in a much calmer manner, coming eye to eye with a tall, lanky Chinese man. The grin on his face is instant and wide. He doesn’t even bother trying to pretend like he wasn’t just kissing Sehun senseless in the middle of the hallway, just walks over to Yifan and wraps him in a tight hug. “It’s good to see you again. I thought you weren’t coming back,” is what he instantly states, not caring that Yifan is not hugging him back.

“I—Thank you…” Yifan speaks after a moment of clear astonishment. It’s said softly, but Chanyeol knows the sincerity in the words. He also knows that if there’s one tall Chinese man around that there has to be another, less tall one too. So he lets go of Yifan and looks for Luhan. He spots the other not a step away and goes over to him as well, pulling him into an equally tight hug.

“Chanyeol…” Sehun speaks right then and there’s a clear tone of surprise in his voice. “You… Know these people?” Right. He forgot. Sehun doesn’t remember. Sehun chose not to remember all of it in order to be able to still have the courage to kiss Chanyeol and take their relationship to an entirely different level. In Chanyeol’s opinion, Sehun made the biggest and most necessary sacrifice of them all.

“Uh, yeah,” he chimes, letting go again of Luhan when he realises how strange this all must look to Sehun. “They are… In my extracurricular class.” His eyes flash over to Luhan for a moment and he sees the small smile of remembrance cross the shorter male’s features. It brings a grin to his own face as well. “They’re great guys. They’re Chinese, but they speak Korean as well. I’m sure you’re going to like them.”

The confusion slowly fades from Sehun’s expression and when Luhan reaches out a hand to introduce himself, it’s a fond smile that instantly spreads on his face instead. Chanyeol grins brightly at the sight of it, feeling like everything’s finally able to fall into place now. And he can’t wait for what the future brings.

Except for his mother, who’s landing in about four hours. He briefly wonders if the Guardian would allow him to change his mind after all. But one look at Sehun’s doting eyes trained on him and he rejects the thought. No, he’s more than fine right where he is. Or well, he would be a little better a little closer to Sehun with their lips on each other again. He doesn’t waste any time in moving back into exactly that position, pulling a surprised noise from Sehun and laughs from their two guardian angels.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... Don't ask, I don't know. lol  
>  Hope you enjoyed this weird and crazy ride.


End file.
